Coping capacity in life's challenges

I'll use the names Eve and Adam and Ruth for this blog post, based on a WhatsApp interchange with someone caring for someone in need...

Good morning, Eve. How are things going now for you and for Adam? Is he receiving the medication and guidance that he needs? Are you receiving what you need? 

Well, maybe the first Eve did not have a friend to send her a message on WhatsApp - who taught the original Adam and Eve any of the things that they needed to know to face the challenges of being first parents? Who taught them to change nappies, what foods were safe to eat, and so many things that they needed to know?

Sometimes our wilderness is rather bleak, like this scene in the Northern Cape

with Sally and me travelling from Nieuwoudtville to Augrabies Falls

I asked a friend if he might have a long - or short-term opportunity for Adam in motor mechanical work. I pointed out that Adam could contribute meaningfully in motor mechanics, and could also help in Information Technology related things that are a real part of any business in 2026. 

This led to sharing thoughts with Eve, and her and Adam's family members that are supporting him in a very difficult season in his life.

More between Nieuwoudtville and Augrabies Falls

Each and every one of us is likely to face seasons in life when we are impacted by hurricanes, floods, droughts, illnesses, or other challenges. We might desire to change employment, change careers, or anything that will lessen the clouds that are hanging over us, or take us far away from where those clouds are likely to be now or in the future! We just need a change!

I've asked the IT department at Kirstenbosch, but I haven't had any response. I've asked two friends if they have opportunities for him in their IT work. Networking is not just cabling, but also describes making acquaintances in business to help exploring possibilities and potential collaborations.  

Strength to you as you help your brother in his time of serious need, and may he co-operate and do his part.  You are coaches helping him to accomplish what he wants to accomplish, but there will be times that he is not able to focus on - or remember - or believe - the good things that he actually wants to achieve.

Then we got to enjoy Augrabies Falls, water flowing
that had simply been held up in the sky by the Almighty

We visited waterfalls near Nieuwoudtville 

You can imagine how it hurts Ruth that her mental illnesses have taken away her ability to practice medicine and use her wonderful gift. But she was blessed for more than twenty years to be able to help in healing and blessing the lives of others. Times and seasons can change, and life can become really tough. But just because someone is underground in a mine and cannot see the sun shining, the sun is still shining delightfully. I can see it right now - well, at least I can see that light is coming through a window that suggests that the sun did rise this morning. 😉🤔😅

Some vegetation in the Robertson-Montagu area.

Sometimes it is necessary to have an involuntary admission to a mental institution like Valkenberg or Stikland. Ruth had that in Stikland, a friend's son had that in Tygerberg Hospital, another family member had that at Valkenberg - more voluntary than involuntary. It is not a desirable thing, but it can be a blessing to the patient and to the loved ones.

Imperfect people like me, your Pa and Adam, create imperfect apps like WhatsApp that are used by imperfect people all around the world and then gremlins are also around and bugs creep in and fiddle. But those apps do enough that is wonderful that we put up with the less than wonderful 😉

Sometimes our life might feel like a desert. I loved my time in the Namib Desert, seeing how much delightful life there is in the desert - spiders, geckos, gemsbok, springbok, hyaenas, grass seed that blends in with the bounteous sand until after the rain when it germinates and makes the desert look like a green meadow. The grass then flowers and seeds, and then it dries out and becomes detritus that blows around and is food for beetles, birds, mice, and many animals, and the seeds blow around with the grains of sand and wait for the next rains. 

I've asked Aunty Judy and Uncle Ron if they recall anything about a challenge that Granny Sippy had with depression. Your Mom had challenges. There seems to be an increasing frequency in the occurrence of many challenges in the 2020s, either presence, awareness, detection, or something. Such challenges have been around for thousands of years. I am fascinated by how King Saul might well have had bipolar disorder as I read about how he suddenly tried to kill David who was playing a harp to help to calm King Saul. Many great world leaders or notable people have had mental or psychological disorders. But the frequency of presence, or detection and diagnosis, certainly seems to be increasing for many issues. I think that I may well have had some disorder, but I probably still have... like ADD, ADHD, ASD (autism spectrum disorder), Asperger's Syndrome, or something 'out of the ordinary' 🤔😰🥴😂 or am I just a weirdo 🤔

Some vegetation in the Agulhas-Overberg region.

It reminds me of an insight that I gained in a workshop that I attended at United Nations in Italy. They were teaching about climate change and its impacts in the developing world. They said that averages would not change dramatically, but we would see an increase in frequency and intensity of extreme events. I certainly have been aware of that in the years since 2002 when they said that. They were encouraging working on 'coping capacity'. That year, people in Mozambique were devastated by floods along the Limpopo River and for them it was a disaster. But they pointed out that most of Bangladesh is less than 10m above sea level and on a river delta that floods every year and everyone living there loses everything, so they don't invest in TVs and things that will be devastating, for them it is not a disaster because of their coping capacity. 

Another insight that came to me was how we were taught so much about food storage, preparing for bad times, increasing our coping capacity. You remember the wheat, wheat grinder, and all that your parents had in your home ☺️

One important coping capacity in our time is coping with mental challenges that seem to be increasing in frequency and intensity, just like extreme climate events.

Eve: "Yup. But some of us make a conscious effort every single day to be the best we can be, and others don't bother and don't care about their impact on other people"

Yes, indeed. But sometimes it is not that person that is negligent, but a disability that is holding them back, retarding them, hindering them, impacting on them. It is easy to see if someone is in a wheelchair that they have some disability. But some people have very real disabilities that cannot be seen. Only trained professionals like cardiac surgeons, oncologists, neurologists, or psychiatrists can detect and diagnose those 'invisible' disabilities. 

I have had to learn to trust their diagnosis and help Ruth to keep in as good 'shape' as she can by using meds that slow her down, prevent her from being able to practice as a doctor, but give her 'mobility' that she really did not have when she was having a depressive following a hypomanic stage of bipolar, or when she has a seizure or hallucination due to her Temporal Lobe Epilepsy. She did not choose either, it was not her fault that she inherited those genes that caused her as a matric student to not get the sleep that she needed and to burn through matric in a hypomanic state and then crash in a depressed state. 

Those episodes were not dramatic then, and she and her colleagues did not diagnose her disorder! As she got older, those episodes caused more and more damage to her brain and so now she is far worse than she would have been if she had received medication earlier in life. She had many wonderful years, but those came to an end - a horrible end. Yes, she was suicidal on several occasions. Ruth did some things that Ruth would never do, going off driving up the West Coast and not having any idea where she was going and what she would do, or why she was going off on her own. That was not her choosing, but her malfunctioning brain making her body do things that Ruth would not do. She might have been at a lower percentage performance level for decades if she were having medication, but she would have been able to, and still be able to, treat patients and prescribe medication if she had been receiving the preventative maintenance that she needed. 

Blessings on you as you help Adam to cope with this nightmare season that he is experiencing. Sometimes it is really best to hand over his treatment to trained professionals in a hospital to care for him and help him to get to a stable state, and then to regularly have them help to keep him in as stable a state as he can be in for the rest of his life. He does not seem to need a wheelchair, but spectacles, hearing aids, heart pumps, knee replacements, medication, and other treatments and interventions help many people to be far more capable than they would otherwise be.

One thing that I often share is that in the last few years in my work, Performance Evaluations were introduced in the Public Service. Every six months we would meet with our supervisor and evaluate ourselves, and they would then agree or modify our evaluation and report it to their supervisors and submit it to the HR department. My boss, who was at Director level, and I at Deputy Director level at the time, told me during one of those assessments that the CEO, his supervisor, had told him that he was not expected to be at 5 all of the time. The expected level on the scale of 1 to 5 was 3. If someone had 2, then training and correcting were needed. If he was at 1, then discipline and warning, potential dismissal were needed. If at 4, credit and congratulations were appropriate. If at 5, then acknowledgment, merit, salary level increase, and sometimes promotion in rank were appropriate. 

But to try and be 4 or 5 at everything would lead to burnout and the person could not be expected to keep it up. Of course, the more one learned and advanced, the more was expected. A good performance evaluation was rewarded by moving up the ranks. Then the next assessment would be in the higher rank. More was expected from scientists or accountants or IT systems analysts than from gardeners or cleaners or security guards. It is saddening to me that some people never tried to advance beyond gardener level in all of their 45 years at Kirstenbosch. But I cannot judge them. If they were excellent gardeners, they were extremely valuable. If they were just mundane gardeners for 45 years, then that would be kind of disappointing. 

Granny Sippy often said "The world needs streetsweepers, but, more importantly, the world needs excellent streetsweepers." That has been a meaningful concept for me all of my life. On one occasion, I was pondering this and wondered 'What if every citizen in Cape Town were to be responsible and never littered?' The Spirit whispered moeniwarrienie, the trees will always drop leaves and there will be space for excellent streetsweepers. 

But, there will almost certainly be times that an excellent streetsweeper is sick or less than well enough to be their normal selves. We need to then be compassionate and try to help them to become what we know that they would want to become again. I was fortunate to be sent on a coaching course at one stage in my career - the focus of that was helping others in our team to be what they wanted to be, but needed encouragement, support, and so forth to achieve their own goals. It is important to bear in mind that a coach helps someone to achieve their own goals, and not goals that the coach sets for the team member that is being coached.

And then, of course, there is the delightful view of Table Mountain from across Table Bay.

Ekpraatteveel 😉 Enough for now. 

I would love to take you to Kirstenbosch for you to enjoy some re-creating in what Grandpa Ken loved to call a little bit of the garden of Eden that has remained intact. Even if you just go and walk ten paces into the garden and sit in the shade and sleep or read or have a picnic, it is a wonderful place to be for ten minutes or for ten hours. The offer is always there. I love to have the privilege of taking up to five family and friends in with me. Then, they do not have to be in my presence once they are inside the gate - I just hope that they will not misbehave 😉 and break any of the rules of the garden 😂☹️😖😭🤔but that they will be excellent streetsweepers or whatever they choose in their career.

Some thoughts about moving from dependent to interdependent

I responded to a message from a friend that I have not seen for a few years, but with whom I have continued to share some messages that I hoped would be uplifting to him. I hope that this adaptation of my message may be meaningful to someone who reads this.

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Good morning to you 😉

Haauw! This is turning out to be a long message in response to your long message 🙂 But hang in there…

It is really good to hear from you. I often see your videos on WhatsApp Status or Facebook and I remember well your involvement in [our congregation], and then COVID hit, and [your girlfriend] moved. I really missed seeing you. I have wanted to share the light of Christ with you and I am happy if some of that light has helped you to have a glimmer in the darkness that you have been experiencing. 

My friend is a very talented stuntman 

and I enjoy seeing him sharing his skills

You may have heard me share some insights that I have received over many years. I share several of those insights with friends like you in the hopes that the seeds that I sow will help someone to have a good harvest. I do not expect replies, but it is a delight when I do receive the occasional reply like this one from you 🙂 

I am now one of the Free Guided Walks guides at Kirstenbosch where I worked as an ecologist in the Kirstenbosch Research Centre up to the time that they 'put me out to pasture' to make place for the younger generation. I have continued to share some of my experience and skills with others since retiring, including the walks at Kirstenbosch - 'my garden', leading the Battle of Blaauwberg walks where I lead people on the battle grounds where the battle of 1806 led to British occupation to prevent Napoleon from occupying the Cape, and then the Cape becoming the Cape Colony in 1814, then the Union of South Africa in 1910, the Republic of South Africa in 1963, the democratic nation that we became in 1994, where sadly men with light skins like yours and mine have been treated as though we are not wanted amongst the 'Diverse People Uniting'... But we continue to sow seeds in the hopes that some will germinate, and some of those will germinate in good soil rather than by the wayside or be eaten by birds, and some of those roots will penetrate deeply enough to survive the next dry season, and grow tall enough to not be killed by fire, and become a tall tree that will produce thousands of seeds every year, most of which will be food or nutrition for tens or millions of other living organisms, and only a very small number will become trees themselves…

I will be starting the firefly walks in early November, the walks that stopped a few years ago. I love to share how we cannot see an ant walking on a tree twenty or so metres away, but if we walk to the tree we are almost certain to see one or many ants walking on that tree! Or a butterfly flying on the slopes of Table Mountain kilometres away, but if we walk to the mountain we will see tens or thousands of butterflies. But - that firefly, only about 3mm long, with the light being produced in just the last one or two segments of the abdomen - less than 1mm - will be visible in the dark at 20 metres. Or, walkers on the mountain with their headlamps that are smaller than a butterfly will be visible from kilometres away. In many ways you have been sharing your light with tens or millions of people on social media - and a very small percentage of people who were delighted by your antics will Like, and a very small number of those will Comment… But you delighted many more than that small minority 🙂 

This tiny insect is very visible in the dark!

A view of some fireflies between about 1 and 20 metres from the camera.

I hope that I am successful in sharing some light, or being that tiny cell called yeast in that tiny part of the bread dough where I respire and multiply to form more tiny cells, that will respire and multiply, and their respiring will produce the carbon dioxide gas that will cause the bread dough to rise and become that loaf that you enjoy with the beans.

My daughter and her family are currently living in a tent at a nearby Holiday Resort while they get themselves on their feet! We support them to some extent, but they need to become self-reliant and they are working on that. I shared something with their one daughter this morning while taking her to school that Jesus Christ was, at one stage, needing Mary and Joseph to change His nappies, and to feed Him, and teach Him to walk, to be a carpenter, to play with other children, and so forth. But He did not remain dependent - He became independent, and then He set a wonderful example of becoming interdependent - and I try to follow that example. I know that I still have a long way to go, but I do try. Some people were offended by what He said and did, calling Him a devil, a winebibber, and other demeaning things, but He still atoned for their sins. Someone needed to crucify Him to fulfil His mission - but I hope that I did not put up my hand to volunteer to do it, but someone had to! And He said 'Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do' and He atoned for their sins.

Can I share your message with the current stake president? You can approach the bishop in the area where you live, but it sounds like you might not be steadily in one ward area! But let the Lord call you to serve in His Kingdom, and receive assistance from the Fast Offering, and share your talents in turn, building children, youth, adults in multiplying their talents, magnifying their callings, and building Zion.  

A thought crosses my mind that I shared with my son-in-law that I mentioned is trying to get his family back on their feet. I also shared a similar thought with a baker who lost his job because of what sounds like an unkind action by his manager towards him and some other employees… You could go to a school like Tafelberg School that caters to students with a variety of learning difficulties. You can volunteer to teach stunts, activities that will build physical, mental and emotional strength for one or many students that might find that to be just the right thing for their future career. Then, if you demonstrate your value, they might allow you to contribute in meaningful ways and pay you for your time and contribution. 

A career like yours is not guaranteed to be wonderfully remunerating, but if it contributes to society, it is rewarding and fulfilling to you and maybe you can help others to get that reward and fulfilment. Sally's father was a professional actor and always advised people to choose very wisely before going on the stage! He would use Noel Coward's song 'Don't put your daughter on the stage, Mrs Worthington'. He survived reasonably by contributing to the stage, radio, TV, film, and One Man Shows in about the 1970s, performing in libraries in small and large towns all around South Africa (like Kakamas, Keimoes, and Kuruman) and in large cities such as in Artscape in Cape Town. Her mother was a musician who had more predictable and permanent employment playing the violin in the National Philharmonic Orchestra, but not every excellent violinist can be a lead violinist on NPO! And every lead violinist will not be lead violinist forever!

Don't lose hope! Let the Spirit guide! Most importantly, I encourage you to be part of building Zion and you will succeed in Zion. That yeast cell will not survive outside the dough that provides it with food that enables it to respire and divide and multiply and cause the dough to rise! 

I have known your adoptive family since I was a child, mourned with them when their daughter died, rejoiced with them when members of the family did well in so many careers, occupations, companies, organisations, sharing talents, skills and abilities to build their families, communities, and our nation - and Zion. I have not been aware of any stories about you, so you can be comforted knowing that the entire world does not know. Just continue to live worthily of the Lord's approval, remembering that He beholdeth not the countenance, but He looketh upon the heart.

You have heard me share my testimony - the Lord has told me, personally, that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is His true and living church. I know that if you follow the same recipe that I followed, you will enjoy the same pudding that I enjoy every day. That does not mean that I never have hungry times, or indigestion, or poor health, or some other opposition - but we are told that there must needs be opposition in all things. I smile and reflect on how any doctor that I consult, or lawyer, or accountant, or stunt artist, got there by facing, coping with, hard work and labour, agonising over exams, practicals, oral exams, social pressures, and all sorts of difficulties that were part of getting their accreditation to serve me in the way that I engage them to serve me.

Why don't you join me at Kirstenbosch, or on the Battle of Blaauwberg walk to enjoy being with your brother, enjoy Heavenly Father's delightful Creation, and sommer to renew our brotherhood? We can chat and I'll give you dates when I will be there. I see so much possibility of exciting ways that you can use your particular talents, gifts or strengths to earn at least enough to be able to be fruitful, to multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it, and have [some] dominion over it and be able to deliver it up with surplus to the Lord when He returns. You can have Him say 'Well done, thou good and faithful servant. Thou hast been faithful over a few things. I will make thee ruler over many things.'

Sorry for this very long reply to your long message 😉

I look forward to your response.

Your brother in the Gospel.

Les

Climate And Self-Reliance

We have had some serious rainfall that has impacted on several of us in Cape Town during the past month. 

It is difficult to attribute photos that are shared on social media, but here are some photos from the two weeks of the extreme weather conditions.

This caused me to reflect on memories from a workshop that I attended at the United Nations offices in Trieste, Italy during 2002. I had been involved in research into climate change for some 12 years, and I found that my impressions were seriously blinkered. I was looking at the impacts on plant species, but was now surrounded by people dealing with health, epidemiology, agriculture, tourism, engineers, planners, physicists, hydrologists, climatologists, and many more!

One major take-home story is that there is an increasing frequency and intensity of extreme events. We have experienced this first-hand in Cape Town during June 2023.

Another major take-home story is that adaptation and coping take place at the local level – ultimately with you, with me, and with our own families. I was reminded of the concept that the nation is made up of its basic units – families. It is mainly individuals that are impacted, and it is mainly individuals that cope or do not cope.

I remember the account of Bangladesh, with 1/5 of the country being less than 1m above sea level, and most of the country under 10m altitude. They face rather dire consequences of sea level rise. Their homes are regularly inundated and so they do not accumulate things that will be great losses when the anticipated floods come. If the authorities build barriers around communities, the inhabitants will have a greater security as most of the extreme events will be held at bay. However, when events strike that are beyond the threshold for which the barriers are designed to cope, the inhabitants may experience heavy losses because they would have relaxed their coping strategies. We compared this to Mozambique where the Limpopo River had overflowed its banks and thousands of people were impacted. In Bangladesh flooding is an inconvenience, in Mozambique it was disastrous. The people of Bangladesh have a high level of coping capacity.

Yes, infrastructure is affected, but coping and adaptive behaviour is inherent in us as humans. For example, we can choose to reduce our vulnerability by not building on a flood plain of a river that has not broken its banks for 10 years, or on the slopes of a volcano, thus reducing our risk. Alternatively, we can undertake a cost benefit analysis, and we can decide that the risk is worth taking in order to have the temporary benefits of fertile soil for producing crops for our family. The question is whether we will have personal responsibility for coping with the impacts of flood (or a lava flow that might be rather more damaging) when they come thus experiencing a setback with which we can cope. Alternatively, if we are not prepared to cope, the flood will result in our experiencing a disaster.

Disaster was defined very subjectively, as is illustrated above. If the community can cope with a serious impact it is not a disaster. Some agencies may define it as a disaster because they decide that it is beyond certain extremes, but the local community may cope just fine. Alternatively, some minor impacts, on top of a generally poor circumstance in a community, can be a disaster because the people had not been able to build up their coping capacity or adapt to the impending disaster. When someone deliberately takes a serious risk, should the authorities bail them out when they experience a disaster? A tough question!

The man in charge of the workshop, while handing out certificates to participants during a dinner hosted by TWAS (the Third World Academy of Science), made fun of some participants who were out taking a smoke break, joking about their skills in risk assessment. This was in jest, but it does stress the importance for each of us to take responsibility for our part in mitigation. We need to take action by adapting our lifestyles according to our vulnerability, using wisdom in our risk assessment. We need to involve our stakeholders (primarily ourselves, and our family members), in preparing ourselves for sustainable livelihoods, considering our abilities to cope with the impacts of climate variability which are projected to become more frequent and more severe so that we will not just be statistics when disaster strikes. Now is the time to start preparing so that each of us will be part of the solution and not part of the problem!

I remember being struck by the realisation that for 90 years we had received prophetic counsel encouraging members to prepare themselves for disasters by having food storage – a focus on Home Production and Storage. We have been counseled for more than a century to improve our Coping Capacity by improving our self-reliance. More importantly than physical self-reliance, the Saviour counseled us to ‘Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal; For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.’ (Matt 6:19-21). May we be serious and intentional in following these basic guidelines of temporal and spiritual self-reliance which will lead to our avoiding loss, or reducing the impact of loss.